Things that smelled, May 2011

For me, the Smelly Month of May started with daffodils.  And rain, and dirt, and crabapple blossoms.

Then came a road trip.  The smell of the air on the Taconic parkway, detergent and stale water in a car wash.

 Alliums, with the one revealing itself to be a maturing morpher.  Starts out vaguely ozonic, hint of vegetation decay with a whiff of onion.  Turns into intoxicating sweetness.

And then, there are the deep purple ones, which have a hint of grape.  Fake grape.  But not at all fake.  Very huffable.

 

Homecoming.  More dirt.  Hyacinths.  Tulips.  Winter onions pulled and spring onions planted.

 Oh, yes, you potent permeating thing.  Viburnum carlesii, you reek.  In a knock you over with white flowers of the northern latitudes way.

Tartarian honeysuckle, which like certain perfumes (remember my time with Apercu?), registers best from a distance.  A new potted rose for planting, with full blooms while those in the ground are still working on shoots.  

Lilacs, and more rain.  

Just rain, rain + pavement + traffic, rain + fake car air.  Rain in freshly cut grass.  Rain, just rain.

 Rhubarb.  Sweet alyssum for tucking her and there.  Sweet woodruff, late for May Wine on May Day but welcome always.

Scented geranium starts.

Always dirt.

Always something new.

And, of course, the irises.  Irises come, like pallida and some of the german bearded.  Smells of sharp lemon and soft sweet lemon chiffon and an impossibly lilting sweet grape.

I have not been with words much in May.  I have been some with perfumes.

But I have been much, much with smells.

I hope you had a good month.  See you in June.


all images author's own

Remembering

"The peonies should be out by Memorial Day."

"Whites, starting Memorial Day, ending Labor Day."

Parade.

Barbecue.  Which I want to spell "barbeque."  Or Bar-b-que.

Three day weekend.

~~~

I grew up through a particular commodification of culture, I think.  I'm pretty sure I remember at least an equal emphasis on parades and honorings, though outdoor cooking and the unofficial start to summer were part of the equation.

But it was almost as if you had to be solemn first.  It made sense, like a blessing before a meal.  Let us take a moment to remember those who, whether by volunteering or by conscription, whether known to you or merely an idea, gave their life in service to their country.

And I would see all of us gathered at the parade, and off to the cemetery, all of those grown ups who would later probably vociferously argue about what justifies war and whether there should be a volunteer army and military industrial complexes and greater good and all sorts of ideas that started off as syllabic swirls and eventually became part of the swarm my own mouth formed...

...I would see all of us gathered in one location.  Out of respect.  Remembering perhaps with different sortings, but remembering.  Quietly.

~~~

Currently, a blow out isn't even a rout at a sporting event.  It's a mattress sale.  

~~~

I'd like to say I'm not passing judgement.  But I probably am. 

I try to remember instead of whinge.

~~~

Nobody warned me about the salute.  And I was just young enough to have it not occur to me, and just enough at the front edge of my adulthood to have it slay me.

When you make it through the funeral of a dearly loved one, when you are pacing your reserves like you do in the pool and are trying to swim as far underwater as possible before coming up for air, when you are doing the best you can to balance giving supportive looks and sneaking shared glances of agony without completely losing it, this calculation is very delicate.  The calculation becomes even more important when you feel like if you do lose it, you don't know how you will come back.

So you sit in your seat, and stare fiercely ahead when you realize the talking is half a sentence from being over.  It's nearly over.  You figure you can make it to the end after all, you will follow the cues, you know will never look upon that person living or dead again, but you will somehow either precede or follow them out of this room with the rest of these people sitting so stiffly in unusually formal clothes.  You get distracted for a moment at realizing just how many of them you have never seen in these kind of clothes.  You realize that these people who are usually familiar but currently in unusual clothes are still sitting, there is no cue to move.  Then there is a rustle in the rear, and an honor guard (you remember that term from parades in years past) enters, and you think, "oh, they will lead him/us out.  How nice."

But they don't move right away.  You need a cue.  You desperately need a cue.  You sit forward again, the air starting to swish in your ears, but figuring you'll just roll with whatever movement comes next, you can make it, you can make it, so  long as you don't make any eye contact now, you can make it.

And then there is an explosion, and you leap out of your chair.  Your cousin looks at you, giving you the same evaluating look as when you started to come out of the roller coaster seat heading down the big hill that year long ago and you both knew that you were on the precipice of Trouble.  At that moment of eye contact, the rifles, for now you realize they are rifles, fire again, and they pierce your veneer, and you start sobbing.  It is too much, this fright and this ceremony and this ending and knowing that people are already trying to remember.  The third and final shot is just loudness in a swirl.

And then Taps begins, and you realize you *thought* you lost it before, and you go back years before, when you saw your first eagle and found a tin cup hanging by a stream as if by magic and turned and saw a certain smile and it all goes into some odd expansion compression as you realize that your past was well into his future at the point that earned this Taps and it makes sense that the bugler is out of tune.

You remember that you can never fully know another's life.  But you deem it important to remember what you do know.

And in the case of Memorial/Decoration Day, you vow to remember what you don't know.

A NYT article exploring the backstory to Memorial Day in the United States.  David W. Blight, "Forgetting Why We Remember."

Thanks to Buglers Across America, because digital taps just doesn't play.

The Smell of Fury: Mr. McGregor's Revenge

Among other places I've been lately is my own backyard.  Where I do attempt to garden.  Things intervene at times -- Mother Nature, life.  I generally roll with it.  One of my tenets for gardening is I only want to fuss if I feel like it.  Otherwise, the joint should be able to largely run on its own.  (I give it roots to grow, it needs to use its leaves to fly, so to speak.)

All is very Zen.  Weeds come, they get pulled.  Probably.  Edges are maintained, but not religiously.  Experiments in cohabitation (will it be okay if I grow this iris in the asparagus bed?) are made.  Harvests are assumed to be about 1/3 of potential, given the fact I like to maintain things wildlife-friendly.  Why 1/3?  Calculate 1/3 loss to wildlife, 1/3 potential loss to whatever, leaves 1/3 for us humans.  This sets the bar at a level that leads to minimal disappointment and maximum happy surprises.

Unless this happens.

Decapitation by rabbit.

In which case, The Peaceable Kingdom gets all rumbly.  The young me who cringed whenever Mr. McGregor menaced Peter Rabbit needs to go in a closet and hide, because the old and wizened me starts looking around for a hoe.

And I don't mean to start weeding.

Until I started growing vegetables, I never felt this kind of id-like response when dealing with things dirt.  I've seen hostas munched down to nibs, and merely shrugged, knowing they'd be back the next year.  But when it came to produce...tasty, fresh, labored, contemplated, organic, so fully imagined I drooled fruit of my labors, fruit whose cost came partially out of the family grocery budget...well...

...like a pea, I snapped.

The first year, I took to letting the dog out and encouraging him to go chase the leaping lepus.  I had to rethink that strategy when he was, erm, VERY enthusiastic about discovering a bunny den.  With babes.  (Turn away.  It gets worse.  I won't discuss, but yes, I had to practice "ethical" euthanasia.)  So I turned to prevention, which of course would have been best to practice from the very beginning.  I've tried hair, pet and human, red pepper spray, row covers.  Hair works erratically, and then only until it rains.  Red pepper spray works, unless it entices, and in either case, only until it rains.  Row covers work, until it gets hot, and then they need to come off.

And I don't like the way they look.  I like looking at greenery in my garden, not gauze.

So, it's a hodgepodge of prevention and acceptance around here.  With the occasional bout of mind-noise anger.

I inadvertently brought this topic up with some 'fume friends.  And, because I had sympathetic ears -- none of which quivered or were floppy -- who inspired me toward a particular slant.  A scented slant.  A proposal for Christopher Brosius.  To wit:

The Smell of Fury:  Mr. McGregor's Revenge

The title came to me in a flash.  But it took a little time--and some painful honesty--to compose a proposal/inquiry.

TO:  Christopher Brosius
FROM:  A Passionate Gardener, an Avid Scent Wearer
RE:  Brief for a New Project


CB, you're one to tackle this one.  It doesn't tell a story so much as take you down of (garden) path of personal development, vegetable patch style.


The story:  Discovery, Delirium, Reconcilement
The backstory:  Innocence lost, Peter Rabbit
The smells:  AT FIRST dirt, fresh air, other vegetation--for this writer, a rub of sage, a hint of garlic chive, the sharp medicine of creeping charlie, the ozonic yet odd decay of an allium flower, the hint of a leather glove, rubber and feet (hello, best garden clog ever).  A HARSH SMACK of tomato leaf which leads to a SHARP TRANSITION as the smell of metal glints invitingly in your nose.  Other writers might propose a hint of gunpowder at this point, but I'm thinking fur and the brush of pine and sweat and the smell of a blister forming as a runner tries to gain on a rabbit while wearing rubber clogs.  A SWIRL again of transition as you briefly but disturbingly ...oh, dear, it is so harsh to say...but you are bold, and you will go where I can't...it is only imagined, but my visual will become your fur plus blood, I think.  So QUICKLY a waft of the fresh breeze only hinted at in the allium now writ complete and non-compromised, green and ozonic all at once, leading to flowers and the crisp smells of green beans and peas and the oddly sharp (gee, is there a connection to the blood here?) smell of a properly ripened but not mushy tomato.  Perhaps a lovely balsamic vinagrette?


Fava beans, your call.  I say it is over the top.  But I have a friend who wants the whole denouement to be rabbit stew.  


Can we talk?




I dunno.  It's a start.  And certainly a catharsis.


I'm more demonic in my head than I ever am when it comes to real life.  In real life, I bought more tomato plants than I had space for.  Already, I'm mourning that I did not think to put Pink Lady, that modern faded something, in the ground first, for then I would be swapping it out for the robust vintage Mortgage Lifter.  But I tend to think positive (oh, hush), so was hoping I would just be offering up the extra plants to a neighbor.


So I brush the dog -- who has fur, I know, and does not offer any sebum-ish moments as I groom him.  I let him roam.  I make homemade non-toxic but hopefully highly repellant sprays.  


But mostly, I putter where I am inclined, let the rest go, and hope for the best.


Maybe one day, I'll be sneaking huffs of a new scent I'm testing, shorthanded as McGregor's Fury amongst perfume folk.  Wait, no--better yet--I'll be a pre-release tester.  You know.


{Beat)


So that this cosmetic can be identified as not having harmed rabbits in testing.

photo of decapitated tomato plant, (sadly) author's own

"stop animal testing" image found on various websites, including Amy's Gripping Commentary

Things I Remember I Know When I am On The Road

*I used to get carsick when I was a kid. There is no escape from your own --or anyone's-- perfume in a car cabin.

*I generally like amber as a category. I tend to think I ignore it during hours 2 and 3. But I just pretend to ignore it, or ignore it enough. (see above)

*when traveling alone, there's no one to blame but yourself. (see above, plus stands alone)

*you can smell cow manure at any speed

*when I was a kid, a house with its own pond and diving raft seemed to be all that and a bag of chips. Today, I saw two ponds with "narrows" and footbridges over. Footbridge = bag of chips. Pond still desired.

*last time I was on along road trip, Amouage sandalwood attar nearly killed me, then was my happiness. Luckily, I remembered this without recreating the incident.

*you can smell freshly cut grass at most any speed

*tandem trailer trucks make me nervous. Triples scare the bejeezus out of me.

*the Falling Timbers rest stop is still frozen in time. With the addition of the smell of Cinnabon.

*I used to be able to smell a lit cigarette is a passing/passed car. I don't know if I still can, but I do know these days there is always a spot near an entry door where the few, the unrepentant, the smoking crew congregate. And it smells like it used to when you opened the door to my dad's office,

*I may never afford a car that does not have cabin noise.

*tomorrow, I will not challenge the scent gods. The next 450 miles will get a cool iris, thank you very much.

Grafting (a review of Boyfriend perfume)

Ah, spring.  The dirt smells great, both of renewal and remnants of decay, along with a suggestion of worms.  The trees here are finally starting to bud.  We're finally moving beyond daffodils in our blooms, though it's still pretty bulb heavy.  Hello, tulips.  Hello, crown imperials with your odd extra-terrestrial upside down-ness.

Lots of walks through the garden.  Where one can't see much, really, but the vision...the vision imagines what is here, and there.  Attention marks when the asparagus roots come up, and how quickly.  Rotates a few vegetables in the mental array and makes note of an adjustment of where to put the seeds and plants for this year.

Looks at the fruit trees, and allows the brain to do a little ruminating on the advantages of dwarf versus full size trees when one's back yard is not an orchard.  Thinks of the rigorous near torturing that is an espalier.  Cringes a bit at the Frankenstein that is a 5-in-1 apple available in one's favorite catalog.

Grafting.  Slice and suture.  Thank goodness it works in surgery.  And while I cringe in principle when it comes to Frankencrafting plant life, I have to admit to having a couple of roses that rely on it.  Not to mention how many of those dwarf fruit trees owe their presence in our gardens.

Heck, I've even tried it once myself.  For propogation of a species.  In my garden.

But that does bring me to a treasured Saturday afternoon horror flick memory.

And Kate Walsh's Boyfriend.


***

If it's perfume that brings you here to the Ledge, you've already read about Boyfriend.  "Why should I have to give up his scent?," or something like that, asked Kate Walsh apres relationship.  Keep the scent, ditch the dude.  But, since one still lives within one's own skin, put in one bottle that which you liked smelling on him...and then that which you liked smelling on you.

Grafting.

Which brings me to Ray Milland and Rosie Greer.  The first time I smelled Boyfriend, the citrus/cologne-y opening was clear.  And then it fell, rather than transitioned, into a pleasant woody vanilla.

The cleft graft is used for topworking older established apple and pear trees, either on the trunk of a small tree or on the side branches of a larger tree.  {...}  Cut the cleft (avoid splitting if possible) with a grafting chisel, large knife or hatchet. After a few trials you will learn the proper depth of cleft. {...} Open the cleft slightly with a grafting tool or screw driver. Insert a scion on each side, with the inner bark of stock and scion in contact.
- University of Minnesota/Extension

That there is a cut and paste from instructions on how to perform the cut and the union in a cleft graft.  A cut and then a union is of course symbolically (and literally) appropriate when it comes to surgery.

I'm not sure exactly how it worked for the chemists who worked on Boyfriend, but let's take a look at how it worked in The Thing With Two Heads.

You see, unlike in one of my other favorite horror flick memories involving heads and grafting.  I won't say the title here, but fans love quoting this exchange:

Girl's head in petri dish: Don't tell me, I've been in a terrible accident, and I've lost my legs. Mad Scientist Boyfriend:  No, it's worse; much, much worse.

But I digress.  In The Thing With Two Heads, Ray Milland's head (okay, his CHARACTER's head) gets grafted onto another body.  Rosie Greer's body.  In the ways of memory and time and mental processing, I forget all about the important civics lesson the movie intended to impart.  (Milland's character was an SOB bigot who wanted to live longer, and needed to learn to get along.)  Instead, sunny side of the street
child that I was, I ended up remembering only the image of the two as one.  In still frames, except for the moment when Milland first sees the other head growing in the mirror.  Somehow, I split off that movie (a sort of Twilight Zone episode in my weak mental sorting) from "the other" movie, the part that happens after Rosie's head becomes full size.  Which is a faint awareness stored way back behind The Defiant Ones, and has overtones of learning to get along.

I share this with you, because at some point in the history of this blog, I had to reveal just how faulty and meandering my collective awareness can be.  Mind you, there is a certain logic to be found, even when not obvious.  But, nonetheless, since I usually review/think of perfume in context and not as a series of notes in my nose, well...fair and complete disclosure.

Anyway, The Thing With Two Heads involves putting two personalities into one vessel, as it were.  Which is how I came to think of it when imagining how I would review Boyfriend.

What's that you say?  I have not yet reviewed Boyfriend?


Right.  Okay, first start with what I said up there about pleasant woody vanilla.  As it turns out, the "boyfriend" part doesn't always darken my doorway; sometimes, it's straight to the heart of the matter.  Whether or not the boyfriend appears, the girl with wood is a consistent thing, and once she arrives, that's what you've got until it's over.  Not that there's anything wrong with that.  Sometimes I get a hint of chemical-ness (this is where I suspect the affordability comes in), and nothing about the vanilla or the wood is notable.  BUT.  Hey.  It's okay.  And given that I prefer my vanilla not too sweet, when I'm wanting to wear some, I appreciate the woody aspect.

It is about here that I believe it is appropriate to note that it would seem Kate didn't really need that boyfriend after all.  Just a reminder that she had one/could have one.  And then go use her own wood.

Ba DUM bum!

By the way, the body butter is quite nice.  Works pretty darn well as a product, and has the nicest parts of the vanilla wood without the hint of chemical.

It is here that I will say that on the Thing With Two Heads scale, this one works in reverse motion.  The one head disappears, instead of growing.

**
By the way, the body butter is quite nice.  Works pretty darn well as a product, and has the nicest parts of the vanilla wood without the hint of chemical.

*
Also by the way, if you want a real mash-up, where both heads have equal weight, that would be Jose Eisenberg J'ose.  No, not Jai J'Ose.  Eisenberg J'ose.  I talked about it here.  Turns out, in retrospect, it was ahead of its time.  (Get it?  It was aHEAD of it's time???  Ahhhhhhhhhhahaha.)



image of grafting for asexual reproduction from TutorVista dot com.


image of Rosie Grier and Ray Milland challenging even the tailors at Men's Big & Tall from Badass Reviews, which proved itself to be just where I should borrow my image because not only did I entirely enjoy discovering the blog in general, this particular entry includes the movie poster (totally awesome, please go see) but the Burt Reynolds Cosmo centerfold which caused one of the longest threads of discussion I've ever seen among some perfume-loving Facebook friends recently.  In fact, I so enjoyed finding this level-headed review of the movie and its director that I forgive them for clearing the cobwebs in my mind and reminding me what the film really was.  Because that scene on the motorcycle with the mannequin head was worth remembering, and it came back full chortle, erm, throttle.

Sweeping generalizations

I started my day by sweeping.  Outside.  An activity which here in America was often depicted as the bailiwick of immigrant women who had trouble speaking English and a penchant for wearing housecoats all day.

There is a threat of rain, and I figured it would be a good idea to gather me maple buds while I may, before they were all washed toward the patio drain, leading to a clog and the creation of a sort of wading pool inhabited by metal furniture and a firepit.

I also enjoy being outside.  It is spring, for realz.  A chance to breathe fresh air, listen to the birds, redirect the energies I would rather be putting into the garden (it is still EARLY spring around here).  And, quite frankly, a chance to avoid sitting syndrome, a malady to which I fear I have become quite prone in this the most recent act of my life.

So I swept.  I swept, and I felt a callous building.  I swept, and I thought.  I swept, and a pile slowly gathered.  I thought about big ideas, about the second half of life.  I swept.  I thought about...nothing.  I swept, and I sniffed Ineke's Field Notes from Paris on my wrist.  I swept.  And I swept.  And I swept.

And I came up with an idea for a post.

Care to come sit?


***
Why Field Notes From Paris this morning?  Because a friend sent it to me, as an expression of something she thought I might like.  Which made me eyeball Field Notes in a different light.  "Ah, creature; someone else knows you, and based on what we've gleaned of each other's nose preferences, thinks I would, too.  Hmmm."  Now I had stereoscopic vision:  in the one frame, an assembly of my previous impressions, which were a mix of yes no intrigued ultimately not worth a full bottle.  In the other frame, a swirling of potential reasons why the matchmaking review set me up on a date with this one.

**
Shhwwwipsh.  Shhwwwipsh.  Shht sssht.  Shhwwwwwwipsh.

I swept.  I sniffed the Ineke on my wrist.  I thought about activities that don't bring us information or data to process, "simple tasks."  The kind of thing that in years past I might have done to music.  Aha!  To music!  Could I be providing my mind with background noise, a low demand but still processable track to attend to while gathering ground bits from various locations and assembling them in one area?  Was "listening to" a scent akin to listening to...a symphony?  a pop tune?  a concerto?  Perdido, as performed at the Newport Jazz Festival?  Perdido, as performed to meet the time constraints of a recording?  Was it right to limit it to one tune?  But it had to be, right, because one perfume was but one presentation, even if it had multiple acts in its development?  Is a symphony to easy, too snooty an approach to thinking of multiple acts?  Maybe a mix tape is more appropriate?

The answer, of course, was "all of the above."  Depending on the scent.

What I had on my wrist was Ineke Field Notes in Paris.

Instead of making a musical connection, my brain headed to the language of 'fume.  And not in a thoughtful way, either.  "Masculine," said the voice in my head.  Sssssht.  Sssssht.  SHHWIPSH.

Well, drat.  So much for deep insight.  But, yeah, once I process the gentle tobacco that first hits me, the whole thing seems rather...linear.  Pleasant, mind you.  But linear.  Like sitting alongside a channel to have a beverage in a tight space.  The view is pleasant enough, and you are enjoying yourself.  Your eyes feel happy.  But you are essentially drinking one thing, and you cannot adjust the parameters of your sliver of a view.  With the exception of the occasional glint of light (something does sparkle in FNFP every now and then--citrus?--and occasionally something else flits by), what you have is...that.

Shhwwwwipsssh.  Shht.  It is nice, mind you, that.  There's an advantage in calming down monkey mind.   Shhhwwipsssh.   Shhhwipppssssh.

*
Later, after I came inside, and grabbed my camera so I could grab a picture to illustrate the post, and ran for the phone which was ringing, and reintroduced a little noise to my meditation, I heard the word "masculine" cross my brain again.  And I thought "Aha!  Caron masculine...yes!  Third Man!!"  And made note of the moment so I would write about it, and ran to gather my decant bottle of 3º Homme that another friend sent me back at the start of my descent, spritzed the opposite wrist the the nominative* masculine, and came back to my computer.  With relief, I realized I am not crazy.  They are not the same, this Field Notes and this Man Who Came After One and Two, but they both smoke.  They both roll in a flower.  The both don't play out so much as sit with you, but in a playful mood.

They do kinda smell the same, in other words, and in the same way.  The Caron is sweeter.  I'd pick Ineke for warmer weather, if choosing between the two, because the Caron sweetness might be to cloying in heat and humidity.

~~
As you can see, I've gone from empty mind to busy brain all of a morning, and we're not halfway to noon yet.  But I needed that time with the broom as much as I relished the firings of the brain as it sought new ways to say "this reminds me of...".

Which, in the way of a sweeping generalization that says "these scents are masculines," is a metaphorically generalizing way of saying "Sorry I've been gone, but I needed that."

Too much input.  Too much sitput.

Not that anything is fixed.  But I think I've figured out a way to navigate the rhythms of the current set of stuff.

The nice thing about the Ineke is that it reflects that idea of stasis and change all at once.  Modestly.

Very modestly.  But there.

Ssssswwwwipppfffh.

"Secret of Chanel No. 5" Interview (FYI)

Will be posting this link as an addendum to our Weekend Book Club discussion, but thought I'd pass along this interview with Tilar Mazzeo from The Sisterhood blog.

Anti-semitism is discussed, and reference is made to research that suggests "we like scents that highlight [...] the 'scent' of our immune systems"--I believe she is referring to research chatted about in perfume bloggery as "the sweaty t-shirt study."

Green, of course

I'd complain about what they do to fresh water around these parts on Saint Patrick's Day, but pouring a bunch of green dye in the river ain't the half of this particular waterway's story.  I mean, it's been a dumping canal for the stockyards, and they managed to make it flow backwards, among other things.

I won't even start carping about that Asian fish.  Given the holiday, I suppose I could start *harping,* but as I wouldn't be using a lyre, and likelihood of being lyrical is low, I'll skirt that harangue.

If I'm lucky, tomorrow I'll skirt around the hungover as well.  So many "honorary Irish," so many green gills.

***
Yesterday, I took some batting practice for the wearin' o' the green.  I put on Gap Grass lotion, then generously spritzed (two times! one arm!!) some Martin Mariegla Untitled.  Guess what?  Very nice.

That Martin Mariegla is an interesting creature; it manages to infuse galbanum--good old dry cool wind, hint of cigarette ash tray galbanum--with a vaguely resin-y sweetness that immediately said "add me to your green galbanum line-up, oh she who loves it so."  And the pairing of it with Gap Grass made a sort of complimentary harmony, seeing as Gap Grass manages to sweeten up green grass without needing to cut it down and turn it into hay.

Yup, it was a very "nice" green.  In the same way the "Irish Holiday" has been mangled into something that hyperfocuses on one story from an often turbulent a complex island, one story which has evolved into a vague tale of a sort of benevolent skinny Santa Claus who lifted his rood and walked all the snakes to the shore where they magically forever went away.

But--and here I raise my hand against the force of fierce edgy perfumistas--I do find that pleasantries are often, well, pleasant.  Sometimes we need to sidle up to a challenge like galbanum, serve our dark brew with a dab of honey, put caramelized onions on the cooked bitter greens, whatever, to help adjust to the taste.  I'm okay with that.  I'd say that Untitled makes a good gateway galbanum drug.

And a fitting way to wear the green, happy cleaned up American style.  You know, kind of like Saint Patrick used a shamrock to get across the idea of the holy trinity.




image of the Chicago River from Chicagoland Real Estate Forum

Do overs, awakenings, and fresh whallomps

It's happened a few times in the past week.  Been plonked down into a fresh look at things, musical style.

The other evening, walking out of a restaurant, hearing The Beatles "The End," right as the "...and in the end..." began.  This morning, hearing Bach "Air" Orchestral Suite #3.

I cried.  Both times.

At this point, what you might like to know about me is whether or not I am a weeper.  Of people who know me, the answer would vary.  Some know me as a rather emotional sort (what was someone said...a "raw nerve"?)  Others think of me as the ultimate Stay Calm and Carry On sort (what did someone else say..."all head, no heart"?)  The truth encompasses both.  But this is not about my personal truth.

Because this isn't about whether or not I'm an emotional nutcase, or the descendent of that guy who fainted when he heard the first chord of "Rite of Spring."  (Is that the story?  Somebody remind me what I'm thinking of.)  What this is about is the astounding power of the human mind to find itself looking at something familiar, familiar to the point of having background noise, a cliche, dismissed, even...and discovering that for some reason, it still has the power to whammy.

When it comes to music, I find this power can be experienced three ways:

1) It's as if I never heard it before, and am back to something raw and primary;
2) It's as if I never heard it this way before, that somehow the life I've lived since first being introduced has circled me around to some sort of fresh yet now full of depth of understanding "a-ha";
3) I am sitting inside a collection of musicians playing a piece and the literal physical experience of the music (oh, those thrumming vibrations, ohhh, those harmonics, oh, the way we're playing together and the way this line is coming together) turns into an emotional/psychological reverberation that is raw, primary, and ahhhh aha all at once.

There are other arts, other life experiences that can be familiar and yet gob-smackingly profound.  To Kill a Mockingbird.  The opening to Wings of Desire, or the scene in Murnau's Sunrise where the husband realizes he really does love his wife.  One human quietly reaching for another's hand, no eye contact required.  The smell of lilacs in the spring. Feeling the breeze across the lake on your bare skin. Calvin & Hobbes.  Toast.

**
This phenomenon I am trying to grasp is not to be confused with the concept of a do-over, which anybody who has spent time in playground games or sandlot sports well knows.  Something goes awry, and the gathered throng has a sort of collective ruling that, yes, somehow Universal Force was unjust or somebody acted against an unwritten but understood rule or the neighbor's dog grabbing the ball and running back home justifies something that is neither an erasure nor an elision of time,  but a second attempt, with the first being struck from the record.  A la "the jury will disregard those remarks."

**
Nor is this to be confused with an awakening, where you feel like for the first time you are fully able to apply your senses and understand something, realizing you never really got it before.  Granted, there is a kinship between an awakening and the second of my conditions, wherein you have a fresh and fuller or different view/experience.  But in an awakening, you realize you never got it before.  In a fresh whallomp, you realize you are getting it again--perhaps with a new angle--but still with that knowledge that you have been in that spot before.  And that you have been given the gift of the whallomp without taking away the gift of your past.

Fresh whallomps require the simultaneous knowledge of prior and current, even as the current seems entirely new.

In perfume parlance, my recent happy dance with Mitsouko was an awakening.  My relationship with Chamade or Bois Blond or No. 19 involves fresh whallomps.

**
I love being whallomped.  Okay, so maybe not always right as it is occurring, seeing I prefer being reserved when in the company of strangers, and having tears descend out of the blue in what might seem to be an inexplicable and alarmingly precipitous way makes me at least as uncomfortable as any casual observer might be.  But I love that humans have this gift, this gift to both have a past and a powerful present that all at once suggests the ability to relish beauty and the opportunity for renewal, to adjust and/or amend our understandings.

Which I've obviously been tracing as a principle in my perfume journey.  But is best recognized as a theme in my general journey.  I hope that you have it in yours.

I'm still trying to come up with a good word for what I am trying to describe here. Rounded up and being held in the corral for consideration are gems and commoners such as gobsmacked, surprised, astonished, ambushed, thunderstruck, overwhelmed, awed.  Thunderstruck and gobsmacked keep rising to the top, but how to get in the sense of wonder and awe?  It's a "fresh whallomp" for posting purposes, but if you have ideas, please share.  Along with steering me toward the dude who fainted at the beauty of a single chord.

Morphing

Frozen in the garden trug a few weeks back
When reading the runes, the "ice" symbol represents "the element to which all things must return before they can change"

I've been on a perfume purchasing hiatus for a while.  I go on them from time to time, for one reason or another or some combination thereof.  The most common themes are: 1) Health, 2) Budget, 3) Nose/Brain fatigue.  And by fatigue, I don't really mean being twisted dry from too much smelling -- though that did happen a couple of times.  I mean more that I am done with the input portion of my {now recognized as} cyclical pattern...that it is time to either ponder, or just let things lie fallow for a while.

It's a combination of thinking patterns (sometimes described as "creative," sometimes just "proceessing") and physical patterns (migraineurs know full well there are times when certain sensory inputs are a Do Not Enter zone of high danger).  To tell you the truth, I don't mind.  Many passions and interests in my life have involved nearly manic hunting/gathering periods, followed by intense exploration, followed by thinkings, followed by time off.  (Or an overlapping progressing more or less following that pattern.)  Filmmaking, for example, is structured that way: pre-production is the hunting and gathering, production is a crazy intense exploration/application time, editing is thinking/application, and then you are done.  So done.  So quiet, after all of those people and all of that noise and all of that thinking.  Teaching, too, runs that way with me: creating and preparing a class is the hunting gathering, going through the semester and guiding/leading is the exploration (because any good teacher knows you aren't simply delivering information, you are ready to process and learn based on feedback from students, whether the learning is about the subject or your own teaching methods), and then the evaluation of the "products" the students come up with at the end of the class.

Not to flog a prone horse, but I could build similar cases for gardening and the never ending process of child rearing.  And those are all longitudinal...gardening, filmmaking, teaching, child rearing, they've all played and replayed the cycle over time.  There are other things, like my passion for cooking, that had one major cycle and has been on a slow simmer with occasional flare ups ever since, or my interest in antiques, or or or...a whole slew of stuff that involved One Big Dance and has since simply been folded into the repertoire, revisited from time to time.

I'll figure out how to categorize my music playing over this paradigm later.

So while the third thing I listed, budget, is an external reality that affects purchased acquisitions, it is really just that:  An external factor.  Sure, if I had a more generous budget...which means at times simply having a budget for it...I'd probably acquire more perfume things.  More splits, more venerated discontinueds, more wacky explorations into the unknown.  But the fact of the matter is, I'd build a back catalogue.  I already have one of a sort; it's not nearly as extensive as what some of us perfume people have amassed, but I'd be deceitful if I didn't acknowledge that the typical consumer would check out what I could sniff at any given moment and cock their head sideways and adopt one or more looks from a list that includes incredulous, suspicious, pitying, evaluative, and pondering intervention.

Who knew there would be a day when I use my piles of books as a shield, a diversion, a way to deflect possible condemnation?  As if there are more respectable things to hunt and gather...which to be honest, I think there are, in a public perception sense...I mean, folks reveal their libraries, their recorded music collection, their Lladro figurines, their orchids.  Funny, isn't it, that in some households, Beanie Babies went on proud display, but meanwhile you'd have to dig around to find my Intoxification, my back up bottle of Black Cashmere, my boxes of splits and decants?

But I digress.  Somewhat.

And somehow, I wanted to get to Parfumerie Generale Aomassai.

Right!  So, I've been on a triple threat smelling/purchasing/thinking hiatus.  Mmmmm...let me clarify the thinking part.  I've not been thinking about perfume on the "smells like" level for a few weeks.  Not directly, not metaphorically.  I've been thinking about perfume occasionally, and wearing it occasionally, but not actively, if that makes sense.  Not with the heightened consciousness of taking in something new, not with the extra awareness I often like to apply to an "old friend" to see if things are the same or changed in our relationship.  So I've been low on perfume reviews.  (What?  What's that chuckling??  Oh, right; I'm never much one for a straight up review.  But they did used to happen more regularly.)

A couple of days ago, I got my first "new" scents in over two months.  (What?  What's that chuckling? A non-perfume person happens to be reading, and that strikes them as a somewhat silly sentence?  Yes, I understand.  But this is the world of perfume.  Try to imagine yourself without a new book, a new movie, or heck, a new foodstuff, or a fresh skein of yarn, to explore for nearly a whole meteorological season.  It's kind of like that.  Non-tragic, but notable.)  Splits of Parfumerie Generale Aomassai, Eau d'Italie Baume de Doge, and Caron Coup de Fouet.

I can nutshell the second and third for the moment:  Coup de Fouet, the edc version of Poivre, is just how I like a carnation delivered:  spicy, with depth...in this case the depth is provided by a woody creamy base, but being an edc, not a dense chewy one.  Early in the wearing it reminds me a bit of an old chewing gum--Beeman's? the clove gum? something on my grandfather's desk.  Anyway, a nice way to blend light delivery with serious notes.

Flowers from Sicily, found on James Hull's Italy Photo Blog

Baume de Doge also takes me to something food-related, but in this case, a fine execution of what on the surface would be a simple cake.  I have to go for cake and not cookie because it is not dense like shortbread...it's lighter, airer, like something that would have "crumb"...but still has enough density that I don't want to go to cocktails.  Though come to think of it, I'd like a cocktail version of this on a warm spring day.  BUT (getting back on track), the cake I'm thinking of is a vanilla with orange zest and a shot of Fiori di Sicilia.  The sprayer is broken on my decant, and I need to fix that in order to see if I get more development like Kevin at NST does.  I'll come back.

But the whomper here, the magic morpher that entered my life just as I was thinking "hey, I haven't met a good morpher in a while"--which I happened to think while wearing my beloved Chamade during the period of not thinking, one of the uber-morphers in my playbook--the crazy morphing something from Parfumerie General, Aomassai.  


Unlike Chamade, which is pretty and then stunningly beautiful, Aomassai is intriguing but difficult, then nearly ugly, then a small fugue of those two plus a third, kindly smell personality.  The burnt caramel opening is one of those things that triggers the "check the oven!" danger reflex, but also pulls me in to sniff it again.  And again.  Is it burnt badly or not?  Then some chocolate thing, not sweet, starts weaving through. Then sweet somewhat threatens, then the not sweet chocolate tones it down, then you worry about calling the fire department again.

And that's just the first round.

Then you get placed in some sort of grass hut, it's kind of damp, and you're pretty sure it's started to molder.  It's interesting, but like the first round, you don't know that you really want to be here.  In fact, you start realizing that for all the challenges of the first round, this second act could possibly suffocate you if this is going to be where you are left.  Because you might dare visit that grass hut, you might wear that wet basket on your head, but you would never plan on carrying through the rest of the day that way.

For me, thankfully, then comes a breath of air.  Of course, whatever was cooking in the oven comes wafting back through (it was at this point I realized I maybe had smelled burnt hazelnuts earlier on, which is a horrible smell, btw, but never came fully through), but at this point, it's more than okay.  And, if you are patient and wait for it, you'll live through a fugue of where you've been and what is coming and then finally settle in a zone that is comfort scent.  Yes, intelligent, intriguing comfort scent, perhaps held cozy all the more so for the earlier tussling.  Now the caramel is just toasted, but has depth from the spices, the cocoa, the wood...and the tussling.

So there you have it.  I've been on a perfume hiatus, and actually still kind of feel like I'm yawning and stretching and getting ready for whatever is coming next.  But then I blindsided you (and myself) with a trio of new smells.

You go deep, you come out.  Cycles.



first photo is author's own
fiori di sicilia from the King Arthur online catalog


Check out Wikipedia's disambiguation page on Morphology -- linguistics, astronomy, math, rivers, more.  It's a fun launching pad for hunting and gathering.   Food for thought in terms of how things change.  And a bit of a chuckle...would that I could disambiguate myself...  

You go right ahead and take that tone with me: Caron L'Accord Code 119

The cello, played well, is one of my favorite musical instruments.  Okay, fine, that's almost an unnecessary equivocation; I mean, how many instruments do you enjoy when poorly played?  I point that out, though, because while almost every one of my favorite instruments in terms of sound requires being played "well," there is an exception:  the sound of a simple flute.  (As in a pan, or three holed wooden.)  But my trinity of saxophone, cello, and guitar?  No hackers, please.

Any one of those, played the right way, is capable of seducing me.  Flat out.  Because if you can play it well, a) you've got talent (an intrigue), b) you've got expression (an intrigue), c) and your instrument is doing something to me that is beyond my brain (an entanglement).  And that something beyond my brain involves the resonance of the sound, the aspect of the tone, the comfort of the register...high enough to perhaps modulate and perhaps "say" things, but low enough to simply go there.  As if the sounding board is in me.  Harmonic vibrations and all.

In the case of the cello, this is a significant trick.  Drag horsehair across a string, and you are likely to produce a sound whose effect is just shy of nails on a chalkboard.  (Sit down already if that sound doesn't bother you.  It sends shivers down my spine even as it rakes bony fingers up my back skin, and makes my innards cringe, and my head try to close the security shutters.  It is BAD.)  Then there's the issue of playing in tune.  Forget rhythm and expression for the moment.  What I'm pointing out here is that the same case of wood that can be the instrument of seduction can also be an instrument of torture.

photo by Tristen K

In other words, there is the ability to use the power of those f-holes for good or for evil.  (By which I assign the sexual consorting to "good" and the fleeing from the room in distress as "evil," so if for some reason your moral code switched that around, please adjust your dial.)

I think it's rather the same when you threaten to assemble some rose, some blackberry, and a "vanilla/heliotrope/musk base."  Were I to see these notes, with the accompanying phrase, I'd turn and hightail it to the next county.  Because my assumption would be the net effect would be evil.  (Which in this moment is NOT a good thing.)

Fortunately, nobody told me what was in L'Accord (Code 119) when I first smelled it.  And I was (and likely still am) too much of a rube to know.  Therefore, I was able to experience it as Rostropovich behind the cello, and not a drunken frat boy who once mock-played a fiddle in a production of Oklahoma.

Sure, say it has fruit and flower.  But say they are presented dusty, and somewhat darkly.  Allow that while it is rather dense, it will not suffocate.  Point out there is a rasp throughout that will never, ever let it be treacly.  Say that the musks, if there be musks, are not those white things that are detergenting so many perfumes lately.  They are the dusk of musks, the ones that start to reach down into the animal register without getting base {ha ha! a pun!!} and make sure there is a bountiful harmonic range.  Make sure that it is made clear that the patch is the kind of patch that makes Coromandel "al dente" but doesn't suggest a head shop.

Make sure, in other words, to say that Richard Fraysse has used his power for good, and not for evil.

Because me, who shies away from patch, who generally likes vanilla dry or bourbon-y, who can handle musk only in judicious amounts, who does indeed like "amber" (but finds that to be a term with range), who can find jasmine piercing and rose cloying, is happy when I wear this.  Musically, L'Accord has the register of an alto blended with a tenor, the warmth of the wood (with the addition of lower registers in its resonance), the tension of the vibrating string that doesn't irritate but rather somehow stirs even as you tacitly sit and take in the whole.


***
If you were here yesterday, you know that in the interest of self-preservation, I just spent nearly a week without perfume.  I am not one inclined to wear perfume when ill; definitely not for certain types of ill.  Given my old relationship with perfume, whenever I return from a scent-free period, I am loathe to start with a "challenge."  It occured to me that the raspy chewy goodness of L'Accord might be a bit much to launch into.  But I had no choice.  I needed to revisit, to make sure I didn't miss anything.  So, with a bit of a wince, and a pair of nostrils ready to close up, I spritzed.

Happy.

Like meeting up with an old friend and picking up after a long interim had passed.  Perhaps on your way to meet them, you worry whether things will still be comfortable, maybe even consider the possibility you will no longer enjoy their company.  But once you get there, no awkwardness at all.  You pick up where you left off, and immediately slip into a comfortable zone.

**
So that's what I got:  a full package of pleasing texture (raspy bits over chewiness) and plush depth (layers, such layers), delivered in the right register.  I'm co-posting with Marina over at Perfume Smellin' Things today, so if you haven't been there yet, go take a look and see what she has to say about Caron's L'Accord and fruity florals.


I hold her accountable for that picture, by the way.  I went off searching for a sensuous, artful, loving picture of a cello, one which centered around the bridge, allowing you to feel the density and follow the grain of the wood, notice the tension on the strings, sense the frail aspects of each individual horsehair in the bow but see how together they formed something which would goad the string into making sound.  A visual representation of that idea of pulling together illogical ingredients for a pleasing result.


I ended up with a scantily clad willowy brunette draped around a centaur cello.  Somehow, it seemed right.


What's that?  I can't hold Marina accountable for my dip into those prurient waters?  Fine.  I'll blame the remaining waft of L'Accord.  Which, by the way, lasts and lasts....*ahem.*  Right.  As I was saying...not Marina's fault.  But I'm still holding her feet to the fire for a few perfume purchases I've made over the years.  

Tempus Fugit (but not from A to B)

That there is the hyacinth I introduced you to a few weeks ago.  This picture was taken today, March 8.  It started popping the flower stalk a few days ago, and every time a new one of those flower "bubbles" opens, a fresh burst of hyacinth smell gently wafts out.  Not far, mind you, but I'm more than happy to bring my nose to the vase.

It's particularly pleasant to be able to do so after nearly a week of scent-free living.  Well, seeing as one can't really live scent-free, let's call it "scent-avoidant" living.  As in, steering clear of purposely applied fragrances, and known tummy rumblers like the TJ's chili my spouse is so fond of, certain fried foods, and pet incidents.

My own child and his variation of The Thing That Passed Through?  Well, I'm a parent.  Can't really avoid that.

Anyway, time moves on.  Time.  As in "Time is the thing that keeps everything from happening at once," which someone posted on Facebook today.  Or as in the thing you must endure to finally experience the smell of a hyacinth.  The thing that heals all wounds.  The thing that allows you to get a glimpse of how Mitsouko could be beautiful.  The thing that has etched my face with charming character when I smile or puzzle to comprehend something.  The thing the boy wanted to see fly when he threw his alarm clock out the window.

It's been a week since I've written here.  Not my intent.

***
Yesterday was Pulaski Day in Chicago and portions of its environs.  Growing up in Detroit, I was aware of the contributions of one Taddeus Kosciuszko, because there is a big honking stature of him charging on horseback there.  Wikipedia tells me that "in Poland, every major town has a street or square named for him."  An engineer who became friends with Jefferson, rebuilt forts, was entrusted by Washington to rebuild West Point, and served the USA for seven years, Kosciuszko ultimately dedicated his estate for purchasing the freedom of slaves.  Kosciuszko was difficult to spell, but easy to become a fan of.

I moved to Chicago, and learned schools and city offices closed because of another Polish national who fought in the Revolutionary War, Casimir Pulaski.  What with no spelling challenge and free time to share with friends, it took me a while to motivate and dig up just what Pulaski did to merit such recognition.

At the oversimplified expense of a guy who seems to have served our country nobly, I've picked up that he was a Polish noble who fought the Russians who then came over here and took a hit of grapeshot.

And therefore shares company with the pirate known as Black Bart.

The mind reels at the potential for local political humor, but I'm going to bring it back to perfume.  Or at least smelling.  Believe it or not.

**

So, thanks to Not Black Bart Pulaski, much of my local universe has the day off.  Including Younger Son.  I decide that after last week -- a Black Week in our health indeed -- we would be well served to get fresh air and stroll the grounds of the Botanic Garden.  The fact that we are at the 42nd parallel, more or less, and that winter and spring are still playing a mean game of chicken does not daunt me.  Time to move.  Time to find that evidence of spring's inevitable arrival I saw during the near 50ºF outburst last Friday.

It was near freezing.  And terribly grey.  So the air was fresh, but pretty pictures were hard to come by.  As was evidence of the impending turn of the earth.  Time, more time, required.

We slogged forth, nonetheless.

It was too cold to catch a whiff of that wonderful humus and dirt smell that a certain kind of spring day carries.  Too cold even to smell the kind of moist air that says "spring."  So we walked, and took pictures, and I spent a little time observing the thing that garden landscapers know:  Nature doesn't work in boxes, and neither should you.  Amorphous shapes, curves...phi.

There was something really quite wonderful about remembering that.  Because I had just "lost" a week of time.  And was feeling a little lost myself as a result.  Usually I'm pretty good at rolling with it.  But this was a day when I really, really, really, could have used a dose of spring.  I thought.

What I was given was the reminder that when given time, Nature works in contours, not straight edges.  And that ended up being being a fine gift indeed.

Now I'll show you the snowdrops.  

Because I remembered that, when given the choice, I don't go for the straight edges anyway.  I remember that, as I've been saying, spring will come, but you've got to give it time.  So the snowdrops were a delight, but it was important to remember time and contours first.

Tomorrow, back to perfume.  Marina and I are going to give some thoughts on L'Accord (Code 119).  And it will be just about the right moment to follow the curve back to sniffery.

Meanwhile, I'm still poring over garden catalogs.  Going to pick out a grapevine to plant.  You know--so that every time I see a bunch hanging, I can nod to Black Bart and Casimir.  

all photos are author's own